


A Saimaa Tale

by LooNEY_DAC



Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 22:40:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9037832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LooNEY_DAC/pseuds/LooNEY_DAC
Summary: Veeti & Ensi, as told to the changelings by Taru through Tuuri





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wavewright62](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wavewright62/gifts).



Do you want to hear a story?

Really and truly?

Very well; then I shall tell you one.

Once upon a time, in the faraway land of the Finns, there was a family that lived on a boat. The boat did not roam the wild seas, as so many others did; this boat was made to roam up and down rivers and glide across the great lake that is called Saimaa.

The boat was a very nice one; the father and the mother were quite proud of how nice it was, even after the Collapse of the Old World.

You see, they had used the boat to escape the Illness, and kept it up as best they could in the years that followed.

The father had two sisters who had escaped with the family on their boat, one of whom had borne a daughter during the first few months. This daughter was the first cousin the son had ever had, so he--well, he acted like your Cousin Emil acts towards you three.

Father and Mother and Son all loved the waters, but the others they had saved were creatures of the land, and so eventually there was a parting, the first of many. Before the family sailed off, though, they made sure the others were as safe as they could be.

Back and forth the boat went, hither and thither, and even yon, sometimes. In some places, they found others, and sometimes these others would make trades with the family. Mostly, though, they found sickness and death, and not a few times the family had to flee from the monsters hiding in the Silence.

Every so often, though, the boat would bring the family back whence they had left the others. The adults would be older and a little grayer, while the cousin would be bigger every time, prompting remarks like the ones the son got from her parents.

The son and the cousin got along with each other as well as could be expected. While all the adults had been hurt by the end of their world, the cousin had never known another, and the son actually preferred this new life. It was this that led their generation to be the one to find the magic that had been hiding all around them, though the cousin was much, much better at it than the son.

Magic is serious and solemn business most of the time, but the cousin liked to tease the son with magic that was flashy and showy and completely harmless, but which always caught him by surprise. Each time she did, he would roll his eyes and growl in a mock-menacing way and say, “I’ll get you for that!” Then the cousin would run away giggling and the son would chase her.

Nothing lasts forever, so there came a time when the boat ground to a stop on a sand-bar close to an island in the northernmost reaches of Saimaa, and it would not start again, and they could not free it from the sands. They were very unhappy that their boat had met its end, but they made do with what they could get from the people on the island.

After a while, they managed to send a letter to their relatives, which was short and to the point: _Boat wrecked. We’re fine. Can’t come back yet._

Without their boat, the mother and the father felt their own time had passed. Before a year had come and gone, they had gone, leaving their son to carry on without them.

After a few years, the son, now a man, married a local woman, and eventually built a boat of his own. In the course of time, they had a daughter, who decided to join the army, so that she could see more of the world than could be reached by boat. This is why she lived when the new boat vanished on a trip during a long-ago summertime.

I am that daughter, and I still remember the tales my father told me of the good times he had with his cousin when they were both your size.

In the meantime, the cousin grew up and found a man of her own, who gave her twin sons. Those sons in turn got wives and had children: Onni, the eldest; Tuuri, through whom I’m telling you this; and Lalli, your cousin Emil’s friend.

So, that’s the end of this story...


End file.
